


The end

by no_nutcracker



Category: The Spanish Princess (TV)
Genre: F/M, Season 1
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-13
Updated: 2021-01-13
Packaged: 2021-03-18 03:34:26
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,577
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28736556
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/no_nutcracker/pseuds/no_nutcracker
Summary: When Catherine catches Henry with her sister, she decides that the best thing for her is to leave.
Relationships: Catherine of Aragon/Henry VIII of England
Comments: 4
Kudos: 31





	The end

**Author's Note:**

> ''Take a run home, I don't like where you're going''  
> The end - Daughter

Catherine walked out of the kitchens, her breath harsh and tears threatening to overflow and spill on her face. She took a slow inbreath and expired out just as slowly, before repeating the action. As her heart and pulsed slowed out, she realized that leaving now would aggravate the situation between her sister and her. She could not have let Johanna spit on their mother's memory but she could not let her dowery go either. She loved Harry and she'd do anything to marry him even if it meant apologizing to her older, crazed sister.

It was not just about being Queen anymore, it had not been for a long time. It was about being with Harry.

She took one last breath, to gather her strength, and walked back into the kitchens.

...Only to find her dear Harry deep inside her sister.

*

The King is quiet in front of her.

She inwardly admits that, now than she'd disclosed the repulsive truth, she doesn't know what to add either. She knows what she must do, she just does not know how to put it into words. Harry's betrayal hurts her too much.

'Why are you telling me this?,' she hears the King's query.

'You're trying to stop Johanna and her husband from leaving Westminster', she responds instead.

The King does not react to her abrupt change of discussion: 'I want my enemy, Edmond de la Pole, returned. King Philip's father, Maximilien, has him and we want a deal to have him handed over. It is why we are stopping your sister and her husband to leave, and shall continue to do so until we get it.'

'You parley with Philippe, do you not?'

'Yes, we do,' he acquiesces.

'You are in the wrong', she announces. King Henry frowns in confusion: 'Only Johanna can persuade him. It is her who wears the Crown, she is the one Maximilien will have to trade to make a treaty with. And I can help with that,' she adds.

'Can you?,' he asks dubiously.

Not surprising, considering her sister just spit on her dowery and her betrothal by sleeping with her fiance. But her sister also hates men and their power over women. She probably took Harry to prove that she could and that he was not different from the others.

She was right.

'Yes, I can,' she responds with all her Aragon and Castile's pride.

'And what do you get in exchange, your Highness?', the King inquires shrewdly.

'Nothing.'

'Nothing?', he repeats with a small, bemused laugh.

It sputters out once the King realizes she is serious.

'For the longest while I thought my Destiny was to be Queen of England. So, even when God himself put obstacles on my way, including poor Arthur's death before our marriage was consummated, I fought for it. For what I thought was rightfully mine.'

The King nods at her in agreement.

'I do not know when, nor how, but my love for Harry started to take precedence over my conviction. Until all I could think about was to be with him, no matter if I was to be Queen or not. I just wanted him', she finishes in a whisper.

'You really love him', the King exhales in a shaky breath.

She tries to smile but she think it resembles a grimace more: 'I do. And now, God help me but, I never want to see your son again', she declares.

The King lets his head fall, an invisible burden settling on his shoulders: 'Yes, I get your meaning.'

'I'll get my sister to deal with you as quickly as possible, so we can all be able to leave Westminster and come back home.'

She rises up with all the grace that distinguish her royal person from the other court members and goes to leave the room in search for Johanna.

_...and then to leave the Palace for the last time and that cursed isle._

'For what it's worth', she hears the King say, 'I am really sorry.'

She turns back to him a final time: 'Not as much as me', she replies. She hesitates before she adds those parting words: 'You know, when I married Arthur, I claimed to Harry that I would never give my power away.' She smiles bitterly. 'I am dismayed to learn I had lied to myself.'

'You were born to be Queen, Lady Catherine,' the King objects, rising to meet her. 'Just because you were not be England's does not mean you can not be Queen of another proud Kingdom.'

This time the smile she offers holds. 'Thank you, your Majesty.' 

*

'What have you done?!', Harry storms in, in all that renown Tudor outrage.

Henry puts his papers back on the table and looks up at his son.

'What are you talking about, my son?', he questions.

'You know what am I talking about, father, do not play me a fool!', he shouts.

He does. The Spanish Princess and her retinue, expect for one of her ladies-in-waiting whom chosed to stay on english soil and marry a soldier, all left two days ago with Queen Johanna and King-Consort Philippe to return to the Kingdom of Aragon. Henry guesses than his son finally had enough of Lady Catherine's constant refusals of seeing him, several messages she left Henry that he made sure were given one at a time to his son to keep him from stopping her departure, and went to the Princess's lodgings only to find them empty.

'I did not do anything, my son,' he declares, rising up to approach Harry. 'You did.'

'What-? What would I have done to make Catherine leave me?!', he continues to yell. However, Henry can see his son's eyes are troubled by something.

The truth, most likely.

'You said that 'the Spanish Queen is someone else's wife and that [I] must learn to find my own.' His son stills, his face going from red from anger to expressionless. 'It seems that Princess Catherine took it to heart.' The King closes on his son and puts a hand on his shoulder, a mockery of comfort: 'She could not support to live the rest of her life with a man who's conquest is a married Queen. Nor her own sister.'

Harry jerks back and throws him a loathful glare before hurrying out of the room.

'You won't find her', he calls after him, stopping the boy. 'She left to a remote place'.

'She doesn't know a lot about England', his son parries as he turns back to face him. 'She did not have the time.'

'She doesn't', he acknowledges. 'But I do.' _Moreover, Princess Catherine is not on the isle anymore_ , he doesn't add.

'Don't challenge me, father,' the boy growls. Because he still is a boy and an insolent one, at that.

_Oh Lizzie, how come we never saw it?_

'Where is she?,' he asks, shaking in his anger and yet again failing at showing an ounce of respect to his father. His King.

'It is not for you to know any longer,' King Henry VII firmly answers.

His son lets out a cry so profound it startles him, before he launches at him, grips him by the front of his robes and yells: 'Tell me!'

'Guards!', the King shouts.

The doors burst open and the guards come in, painfully detaching his enraged son from him.

'What shall we do, your Highness?,' the Captain of the guard asks placidly.

Harry is still spouting threats and curses at him and promising to ' _find Catherine before you can do anything to her_ '.

Henry never intended to do anything to the Princess. All he wanted was to keep her away from his son to keep their Kingdom from perishing, per Lizzie's demands. Now he shall do so on the Princess's plea.

_God help me, I never want to see your son again_ , she had said.

And as long as there is life in his body, he vows she will not.

'The Prince has fallen ill,' he claims.

It is not far from the truth. It seems Harry has lost his mind since Lizzie's death. Only the Princess's presence or even the possibility of seeing her would calm him. Now without her his son looks a raging bull. 

'Take him to his chambers and allow no one to enter except the Court's Physician,' he commands.

The guards nod and obey. It would gladden his heart to see such obedience from his subjects, when his son can't even respect his words let alone obey, if it was not for keeping said-son to turn against him.

*

Henry knows behind all that wrath and violence, there is hurt most of all. He chose to sequester himself in solitude after Lizzie's death. He thinks Harry would have too if it hadn't been for Princess Catherine. Now, she is gone and Harry has to live with double grief; the loss of his mother, whom was called back by God, and the loss of his love, who left on her own volition.

Henry wishes he could help his son, but the boy has to grow and for that he has to realize you cannot have everything you want. It is the first thing you learn as a King; that your wants always come second to your Kingdom. The Princess recognised it and now it is Harry's turn.

And Henry knows that, once Harry finally acknowledges it, his son will be a Great King.

**Author's Note:**

> ...Or not.


End file.
